Chapter 711: Adventurer Sector

The scent of hot oil and toasted grain led him straight to the common lounge.

Silas stepped through the archway.

The morning sun had climbed over the spires of Central City and laid long golden rectangles across the polished hardwood and in the little kitchenette tucked into the corner, Aeliana stood over a low iron stove.

’Aeli looks beautiful today...’

She’d pulled her long blond hair back into a neat braid that hung over one shoulder, tied off with a green silk ribbon.

She wore a plain cream linen dress with the sleeves rolled to her elbows, and she held a flat wooden spatula like it was a scepter, flipping golden flatbreads on a greased griddle.

A faint pink sat high on her cheeks, and the stove didn’t explain it but her thoughts did.

’Lord Sy’s dick is so majestic and his cum is thick too~ I lapped most of it from the ground with my tongue, I hope he doesn’t find out.’

Beside her, Kitsuna Solenne was perched on a high stool, her nine silver tails tucked behind the rungs to keep them out of the flour.

The fox beastkin was slicing sweet mountain tubers into thin, perfectly even rounds, her pointed ears twitching with nervous earnest focus.

Over on the long velvet sofa, Rika was still unconscious.

The petite Goddess of Beasts lay curled in a small ball beneath a green wool throw with her face buried in a pillow.

Nestled in the crook of her neck, the golden phoenix hatchling snored in tiny puffs of ember-smoke that drifted toward the ceiling and dissolved.

A string of drool ran from Rika’s lip onto the cushion as the slumber herbs Morwenna had slipped into the lemien juice had done their work.

...Neither the girl nor the bird looked ready to stir before noon.

"Good morning," Silas said, stepping into the kitchen.

Solenne jumped.

Her wooden knife clattered onto the cutting board, she whipped around with her golden eyes wide, and all nine tails fluffed out into a silver fan before she frantically tried to smooth them down.

"A-Ah! Lord Silas!" She slid off the stool and bowed so fast her forehead nearly hit the cedar counter. "Good morning! Forgive me! I didn’t hear your footsteps! I was only helping Lady Aeliana with the meal! I hope the knife didn’t wake you!"

"You’re fine, Solenne. Sit back down before you lose a finger," Silas chuckled, waving a hand to ease her panic. "Smells great in here."

"The grain is fresh," Aeliana said smoothly, without looking up from the griddle.

She slid a pair of crisp flatbreads onto a wide ceramic platter. "The markets below receive shipments from the eastern plains at dawn so the dough required very little leavening."

Aeli turned and set the platter in the middle of the small dining table, next to a bowl of whipped honey-butter, a plate of sliced salt-pork, and a pot of steaming black tea.

"Please take your seat, Lord Sy," she said, gesturing to the head of the table. "The meal is ready..."

Silas sat down and pulled his chair in.

Solenne took the seat across from him with her hands folded in her lap and her ears lowered respectfully, she did not touch her plate until he’d picked up his fork.

Aeliana poured the tea.

Her slender pale fingers weren’t quite steady, and a thin stream slopped over the rim of the cup and into the saucer.

’S-stop being so clumsy or he’ll find out you were there...’

She mopped it with her sleeve and pretended it hadn’t happened. As she leaned in, her silver-green eyes flicked downward.

They rested on the high collar of his black tunic, right over the spot where his illusion veil hid Morwenna’s little pink souvenir and the entire necklace Eluned had left him.

They stayed there for a bit then they jerked away, the pink on her cheeks climbed all the way to the tips of her ears.

’S-stop looking you pervert!’

Aeli straightened herself, smoothed the front of her apron twice, and stepped back.

She didn’t ask any questions which was weird, making Silas’s eyebrow raise.

’But I guess it’s okay...’

She pressed her lips together like someone sitting on a very large secret, and said nothing however Silas froze with his fork halfway to his mouth.

A cold prickle ran down the back of his neck.

’Does she know?’ His pulse skipped. ’No... The sound wards in the master bedroom were on... The doors were shut. She was knocked out cold from the herbs, same as Solenne and Rika so there’s no way she heard a thing.’

Morwenna told him later that she had drugged everyone... still her serene composure was unnerving.

Aeliana was usually chatty in the mornings. She’d spend breakfast reciting something or rambling about a Chapter she’d read by candlelight, or complaining about the quality of everything.

Today she wouldn’t look at him for longer than a second, and every time she did, she went a deeper shade of pink.

...It felt like being avoided by a very flustered cat.

He glanced sideways at Solenne.

The fox beastkin was happily nibbling the edge of a flatbread with her cheeks puffed and her nine tails swaying behind her chair in slow contented loops.

"Mmmm~ Mhm~ Mm~ Fooooood~" She hummed a cheerful little tune and reached for the honey-butter, completely blind to the tension crackling over the table.

Silas cleared his throat and took a sip of black tea to steady himself... It was bitter enough to make his eyes water.

"Solenne," he said, setting the cup down.

The kitsune swallowed hurriedly, her ears shooting straight up. "Y-Yes, my Lord!"

"Finish your breakfast and gather your notes... You and I have somewhere to be this morning."

Solenne tilted her head, golden eyes blinking.

"Somewhere to be? Where are we going, Lord Silas?"

"We’re going to meet some dwarves," Silas said. "If we want to build your mining frames and get Titan-01 running in Blessed Land, you can’t forge every bracket and gear by hand... You need hands... You need heavy hammers and master smiths who can pour molten steel without complaining about it and you told me you knew a few."

They already had dwarves but he needed more... A lot more.

’A small army of dwarves wouldn’t be bad at all.’

Her face lit up as a radiant breathless smile spread across it and her tails fanned out behind her, trembling with excitement.

"D-Dwarven smiths?!" She clutched her linen napkin to her chest. "Real foundry masters?! Oh, my Lord, with proper dwarven hands on the heavy casts, we could build three hydraulic chassis a week... I have the dimensional specifications right in my satchel, I’ll be ready in five minutes!"

"Four," Silas said.

"F-Four!"

Aeliana lowered herself into a chair at the end of the table and daintily picked up a teacup with two fingers.

She took a slow measured sip with her silver-green eyes watching Silas over the rim.

"Where do you intend to look, Lord Sy?" She asked, she was a bit interested in his plans after all.

"The Adventurer’s Sector," Silas replied, keeping his voice level. "Near the hiring halls... Solenne knows a few independent clans who got squeezed out. The big guild shops charge too much overhead, and their smiths are locked into non-compete clauses so I want people who are hungry for real work."

Aeliana nodded once and set her cup down with a soft pristine clink.

"A sound strategy," she said calmly. "Independent craftsmen harbor greater loyalty to the hand that feeds them, provided the coin is true and the iron is plentiful... I wish you and Solenne a productive venture."

"Thanks," Silas muttered, still trying to read the blank porcelain wall that was her face. "Keep an eye on Rika. If she wakes up, feed her flatbread and let Morwenna sleep. She’s... exhausted from the sparring session."

Aeliana lowered her gaze and picked up a piece of toasted bread with regal grace.

"Of course, my Lord," she said, her voice sweet and completely unbothered. "I shall ensure our brave pirate is not disturbed while she recovers from her... rigorous combat training."

The pause before "rigorous" lasted too long, and she coughed into her fist halfway through it.

Silas didn’t linger.

He finished his flatbread in three bites, washed it down with the rest of the tea, and stood as his chair scraped back a little too loudly.

"Thank you for breakfast, Aeli... You’re a lifesaver."

"You are most welcome, Lord Sy."

He walked toward the glass doors that opened onto the private balcony.

The morning air rushed in as he pushed the latch, carrying the scent of mountain wind and the faraway hum of transit-barges waking up over the city.

Solenne scurried after him with a leather satchel stuffed with rolled blueprints and brass calipers, her tails tucked tight against her legs to keep them out of the doorframe.

Before Silas stepped outside, he glanced back.

Aeliana stood at the table with her teacup in one hand.

She was watching him go, and as their eyes met with her free hand lifted and two fingers touched the left side of her own neck... Exactly where Morwenna had bitten him.

’I’m guessing she was watching us or something...’

She smiled and hid the lower half of her face behind her teacup a second later.

’What a naughty woman.’

Silas turned around so fast he almost walked into the doorframe.

"Are you well, Lord Silas?" Solenne whispered.

"I’m great," Silas said with a sigh. "Let’s go."

Out on the stone terrace the wind tugged at his tunic, and the whole of Central City spread out below them in terraces and chimney smoke and slow-turning sky-barges.

Silas pulled the silver disguise ring from his pocket and slid it onto his index finger.

"Ready, Solenne?"

"R-Ready, Lord Silas!" she chirped, golden eyes sparkling.

He channeled a pulse of mana through the band.

SHING!

A soft prismatic distortion washed over him like running water.

His dark hair lengthened into sleek, ink-black locks that spilled over his shoulders.

His blue-and-gold eyes deepened to sharp violet, the casual tunic melted away and was replaced by the clean lines of a tailored three-piece suit with a silver-leaf crest pinned to the lapel.

His shoulders narrowed a little, and his posture slid into the effortless elegance of Kara White.

"Let’s move," Kara said, in a smooth feminine voice that cut cleanly through the morning breeze.

"Y-Yes, Lord Sil— Vespera!" Solenne corrected herself immediately, glancing around the empty terrace like a conspirator. "I mean... yes!"

Kara stepped up to the edge of the marble balustrade and looked down the dizzying drop toward the lower terraces.

FWOOOOSH!

A violent vortex of emerald wind mana erupted beneath their boots.

"E-Eek!" Solenne yelped as Kara’s arm wrapped around her waist and hoisted the kitsune off the stone like a sack of flour.

The wind caught them like an invisible sail and lifted them high over the roof of the Celestial Reach Hotel, then launched them out across the open skies of Central City.

Silas glanced back once at the shrinking balcony.

The glass door was still open and a slender figure in cream linen stood framed in it waving at them.

"See you later!" Aeli yelled and Kara smiled, she would have waved but she didn’t want to heal her second arm back.

’Valerius will come later,’ Silas thought, as the cold air rushed past his violet eyes. ’Until then, let’s get this done...’

The air above Central City smelled of chilled ozone and distant cloud mist.

Below them, the sprawling terraces ran outward like steps carved into a mountain of polished slate.

Sky-barges slid along the glowing cyan mana currents that webbed the upper district, their canvas sails rippling with a vibrating hum as they steered clear of private spires.

Farther down, the crystalline roofs gave way to dark brick, zinc flues, and a tangled lattice of industrial tramways.

Kara banked left, tilting her shoulders against the wind.

Held tight under Kara’s arm, Solenne was as stiff as an iron ingot.

Her small hands were clenched into white-knuckled fists around the lapels of Kara’s tailored coat with her knuckles buried in the wool.

he’d squeezed her eyes shut so hard that her silver lashes trembled, and all nine of her fluffy tails were wrapped in a desperate knot around her waist and thighs, so the updrafts couldn’t turn them into one very expensive parachute.

"Solenne," Kara said, her feminine voice pitched smooth and clear over the whistling air. "If you squeeze that lapel any harder, you’ll tear the tailoring... This suit cost a lot of Spirit Credits."

"F-F-Forgive me, Lord Vespera!" Solenne’s voice wobbled with every dip in air pressure. "I have a deep respect for your garments! But my ancestors were creatures of the burrow and the forest floor... We aren’t meant to drift this far above granite foundations! If the wind fails, we’ll leave two very distinct holes in the cobblestones!"

"The wind won’t fail," Kara said with a chuckle. "Why would it fall when it carries us forward?"

"That’s what people say right before the wind fails!"

"Then I’ll catch you."

"...You’re holding me with one arm!"

"My arm is a very strong arm, thank you very much..."

Solenne made a tiny strangled noise that was somewhere between a sob and a squeak, and the tail knot around her thighs pulled even tighter.

Beneath the feminine facade, Silas adjusted the flow of his Gold Core.

He kept the emerald cushion broad and steady beneath their soles, letting the air currents slide off its rim instead of buffeting them straight on.

"Lord Vespera," Solenne ventured in a small voice, eyes still shut. "Is it true that wind mana sometimes makes people... talk to themselves?"

"I think it’s only when they’re nervous."

"Are you nervous?"

"Open your eyes, Solenne," Kara said, very calmly. "We’re dropping below the cloud shelf."

Solenne hesitated as one pointed silver ear twitched upward before she cracked her right golden eye open by a sliver.

The glittering towers of the Upper Tier had vanished behind them.

They were descending into the rugged, soot-stained belly of the Adventurer’s Sector, a noisy crowded basin nestled at the base of the city’s second ring wall.

The air down here was thick with coal smoke, roasting boar fat, and cheap dwarven stout.

The buildings sat low, built from heavy river stone and rough-hewn pine logs with their roofs patched with scrap iron to survive stray training spells and the occasional drunken brawl.

Just past the sprawling hiring hall of the Iron Compass Guild, beside a stagnant drainage canal, a cluster of dilapidated shanties crouched in the mud.

Most of them were half-sunk, their timbers rotted by sewer damp and their chimneys crooked.

"There?" Kara asked, pointing toward a long, low shack built from mismatched salvage pine and rusted boiler plates.

"Y-Yes, my Lord!" Solenne gasped, finally unknotting her tails as the ground rushed up to meet them. "The second shack on the left! The one with the broken anvil painted on the shutter! That’s where the Greyrock Clan has been staying!"

Kara guided their descent with a subtle pivot of her boots.

FWOOOSH!

The cushion of green wind flared outward over the muddy alley, scattering a cloud of flies and dried wood chips, and their boots settled onto the soft earth.

The landing was so smooth that the mud barely touched the welt of Kara’s polished black leather shoes.

Solenne hit the dirt and immediately stumbled forward two paces, knees shaking, and pressed both palms flat against the wall of the shack just to confirm it was solid.

"Praise the soil," she whispered, letting out a long ragged exhale. "Solid ground... Honest stone... Beautiful, unmoving mud..."

"Pull yourself together, Chief Artificer," Kara chuckled, smoothing her lapels and straightening the silver-leaf crest over her heart. "You represent Blessed Land now so don’t go kissing the rotting wood."